Azerbaijan’s BAKU (AP) After over ten years as a professional triathlete, Pragnya Mohan can no longer train in her home country of India due to the extreme heat. She fled the heat to practice in the UK, but she fears that one day her sport may be completely eradicated due to global warming.
At the 2021 U.S. Olympic trials in Eugene, Oregon, American discus thrower Sam Mattis reported temperatures as high as 44 Celsius (111 Fahrenheit), which caused some competitors, officials, and spectators to faint. Katie Rood, a soccer player from New Zealand, remembered that warm-ups were interrupted by extreme heat and humidity as she trained in heat chambers for the Tokyo Olympics.
All three discussed the threat that climate change posed to them, their supporters, and sport in general during the United Nations climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan. They are among the athletes and leagues attempting to raise awareness of climate change and encourage action from their billions of fans globally.
At a panel discussion, Mohan stated that triathlons may eventually disappear if climate change is not tackled and managed carefully.
Heat isn’t the only factor. According to Mohan, the Paris Olympics this year had to postpone a few triathlon competitions because to the Seine River’s high bacterial levels caused by frequent rains, which have increased as the atmosphere warms and retains more water.
In an effort to lower emissions and encourage supporters to take action against climate change, a number of elite soccer teams have joined forces to form a climate action alliance. Real Betis, a La Liga team, is one of them. At a different panel in Baku, Rafael Muela Pastor, general manager of the club’s foundation, stated that soccer is the most significant and powerful sport in the world and that we must take action.
He asserted that we have a responsibility to use our superpower.
According to Leslie Mabon, an environmental systems lecturer at the Open University of the United Kingdom, while athletes can help spread awareness of concerns like global warming, the most impactful activism frequently originates from outside of the sport.
According to Mabon, athletes may make a difference, but not always at the highest levels. It is quite challenging to persuade the governing organizations, leagues, and FIFAs of this globe to take action because of the financial ramifications of the issues involved.
Concerns about heat and human rights did not deter FIFA, the world soccer governing body, from hosting the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, a nation that has been condemned for its treatment of migrant labor, among other things. Additionally, sports executives’ seemingly admirable behavior might occasionally be little more than greenwashing.
In order to promote the development of climate-resilient football and increase awareness of climate change, FIFA President Gianni Infantino extended a cooperation with Pacific Island countries while attending COP29 and shared on Instagram. That was just a few months after FIFA and Aramco, the national oil company of Saudi Arabia, struck a sponsorship agreement.
In an open letter, women soccer players from all around the world urged FIFA to revoke the agreement, pointing to the nation’s record on LGBTQ+ and women’s rights as well as the contribution of fossil fuel production to climate change.
An Associated Press request for comment was not immediately answered by FIFA.
“When you still have these kinds of deals in place, it’s very difficult for anything that comes from the top levels to be taken seriously or to be taken credibly,” Mabon added.
In addition to increasing inequality, climate change is driving up the cost of sports. Athletes will have to spend more money and travel farther to practice and compete as some locations become unsuitable for sports due to insufficient snow or extreme heat, according to Jessica Murfree, assistant professor of sport administration at the University of North Carolina.
According to her, that will have a significant effect on athletes and athletes-to-be. It causes the socioeconomic gap between the privileged and the underprivileged to widen, which in turn becomes a matter of justice.
The goal of sports is to adjust to a warmer planet. Competitions are occasionally rescheduled to other locations or start times are altered to cooler periods of the day. Then comes technology: to keep players and spectators cool during its World Cup, Qatar invested billions to air-condition stadiums.
However, according to New Zealand soccer player Rood, sports cannot ignore the climate crisis.
“It’s not just the isolated events that happen once or twice a year,” she said in an interview, adding that the energy it demands is a big expense to the environment. Those conditions can’t always be created because of the training and the lead-up.
And that worries Tina Muir, a former British elite runner who uses her company, Running for Real, to raise awareness of the threat posed by climate change. According to her, athletes are trained to push themselves over their breaking point.
For many athletes, it will resemble a war of attrition, Muir stated. It’s who is best equipped to cope with these difficult circumstances. but also turns into something of a safety game, where you can endure it but end up hurting yourself in the long run.
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Pineda was in Los Angeles when she reported.
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